Unmanned aircraft, also known as drones, can no longer be used by people or state agencies to conduct surveillance without landowners’ consent. The law carves out some exceptions for law enforcement and media covering news event, and makes adding a weapon to a drone a felony. Outdoorsmen and outdoorswomen need to pay attention: using a drone to hunt or fish is now a misdemeanor. Some of the wording in the budget still leaves questions about how to legally use drones, and the new rules may make it difficult to use drones to take photographs or video for artistic purposes, said Sarah Preston, of the ACLU of North Carolina. “There’s still a lot of stuff that’s left up in the air,” she said.

During the final days of the budget train wreck in Raleigh, H1099 (Unmanned Aircraft Regulation) was slipped anonymously into the 2014 budget. This is the perfect, shameful and shabby end to a process where the GOP-led NCGA has failed to protect our civil liberties. Read More

Poll: 72% of North Carolina Voters Support Warrant Requirement for Drone Surveillance

As State Legislative Committee Studies Ways to Regulate Drone Use, New Poll Shows Overwhelming Support for Warrant Requirements to Protect Privacy

RALEIGH – Seventy-two percent of North Carolina voters believe law enforcement and other government agencies should be required to obtain a warrant from a judge before using a drone, or unmanned aircraft, to conduct surveillance on a private citizen, according to a new poll released today by the American Civil Liberties Union of North Carolina (ACLU-NC) and conducted by Public Policy Polling. Only 13% of those polled said they did not support the warrant requirement. Read More

The debate over the use of drones – especially by domestic law enforcement agencies – is an issue that’s drawing lots of attention these days as more and more citizens and public officials of all political persuasions worry about the privacy implications.

Last year, the North Carolina General Assembly considered a promising bit of legislation (”The Preserving Privacy Act of 2013”) that would have prohibited individuals and government agencies, including law enforcement, from using drones to gather evidence or other data on individuals without first obtaining a warrant that shows probable cause of criminal activity. The bill included an exception that would have allowed law enforcement to use a drone to conduct searches if the agency possesses “reasonable suspicion” that immediate action is necessary to prevent certain types of immediate harm.

Unfortunately, the bill never advanced and now things appear to be headed in a distinctly different direction. Read More

North Carolina is yet another example of legislators wanting to play doctor, telling real doctors how to practice medicine and how to care for our patients. Medical decisions must be based on scientific evidence and made by patients in consultation with physicians, not the state or federal government.

Let’s be clear. Senate Bill 132 and Senate Bill 353 collectively have one purpose: To restrict the reproductive rights of women in North Carolina by interfering with the practice of medicine. The two leading state ob-gyn associations – the North Carolina Obstetrical and Gynecological Society and the North Carolina Section of The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists – have joined together to stand against these bills because they undermine the very fabric of what’s important: Patient safety and access to quality medical care for all women in our state.

ACOG respects our members’ deeply held personal beliefs on abortion. While we can agree to disagree about abortion on ideological grounds, we must draw a hard line against any legislation that threatens women’s health. That’s why we’re setting the record straight for all politicians: Get out of our exam rooms.